Most of the time, people look forward to replacing old, worn things with newer, better models. But this isn’t always true.

What is something you own that you just don’t want to throw out or give away? Why do you think you feel that way?

In the Sunday Review essay “All Things Come to an End. Even My 2001 Saturn,” Jean Thompson writes, “It’s only a car, and there’s no point in being sentimental,” but only after describing the car’s declining state in loving, nostalgic details:

Urbana, Ill. — When you drive an old and shabby car, as I do, you try to make the best of it. There’s even a kind of reverse bragging involved: just how old, how shabby, how gruesomely it can shed parts and systems and still get you from place to place. There are cars in far worse shape than yours on the road. So you tell yourself. The ones whose mileage equals a trip to the moon and halfway back, the ones that need to be push-started every time, the ones lacking structural integrity in their roofs or floorboards.

Both you and the car perfect a kind of cognitive dissonance. Surely things will go on as they have been for a while longer, indefinitely, perhaps. After all, the car starts reliably and runs without much fuss. Maybe your luck will keep on holding, in defiance of expectations and natural law, even as the great world spins and its orbit degrades.

… I found a picture online of an L-series wagon, silver gray, like mine. It hurt a little to see it so new and shining and unmarked. My car has a smear of yellow paint on the rear bumper where I backed into a gutter pipe in Portland, Ore. Over one wheel well is a similar smear, red, where it kissed a dump truck. Three of the hubcaps have come off and I could not tell you when. The remaining one chirps merrily whenever I hit a patch of rough road.

The emergency brake no longer functions. The driver’s seatbelt does not fasten properly and the belt must be secured to the buckle on the passenger side. One day the glove box fell open and could not be persuaded to close again. This meant I had to tear out the wiring so that the light inside wouldn’t drain the battery. One side mirror is secured with tape. The last time I thought the turn signal bulbs were going bad, it turned out that mice in the garage had been chewing the wiring.

The Saturn hauls the dogs to their daily park runs. A certain relaxed standard of auto cleanliness prevails. Once, when I took the car in for an oil change, a mechanic took in the floor’s loamy layer of grit, gravel and vegetable matter and asked if I lived on a farm. “Yes,” I lied bravely. “Hard to keep your vehicle clean when you run a cow and calf operation.”

Meals, many, have been eaten in the front seat, and coffee, much of it, spilled. Of course I carry a lot of dog gear, such as extra leashes and chew bones. There’s a jump pack for dead batteries and a tire inflater you plug into the accessory port. In winter I add a small snow shovel, a container of ice melt, and a heavy cotton rug suitable for improving rear wheel traction. There’s duct tape, of course, and a selection of bungee cords. A sealed QuikClot sponge for first aid. A few old towels, assorted Kleenex. Four “I Voted” stickers affixed to the dusty steering column.

Last month, on a day of savage cold and scouring wind, I gave a ride to a young man from Indonesia who had just arrived here and gotten horribly lost in the brown flat fields on the edge of town. He was happy to get out of the cold, but disconcerted at having to wedge his knees underneath the broken glove box, and being made to hold a plastic tub of tennis balls on his lap.

Students: Read the entire essay, then tell us:

— Do you relate to Ms. Thompson’s feelings about her car? Why or why not?

— Why do you think Ms. Thompson feels as she does?

— If not about a car, what is the item in your life you are most reminded of as you read her words? Or, if you don’t relate personally, who in your life is holding on to something that is well past its prime? What is it?

— Do you think if Ms. Thompson keeps her next car for 15 years, she will have similar feelings about it as she does her old Saturn wagon? Explain.

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